It has been difficult, all these years, for me to say, “My teacher,” to accept with gratitude and a degree of humility that I have more to learn, and that when I’m ready to learn, the teacher will appear. Now it has happened.

So the place breathes—if it breathes at all—an air of masculinity and propriety that seems to have disappeared but of course has not really. When I go into the dining room to eat, I am nearly always asked, “Are you meeting your husband?” (“No, I’m meeting myself”) or “Just one?” (“Isn’t one enough?”).

Now, all these years later, I wonder if the fact that these boys were all scions of well-known families contributed to their noteworthy mildness. Was there then—certainly not now—an emphasis on right behavior and staying out of trouble that actually corralled their adolescent male desire?

My little practice restored my faith in one crucial phrase, one crucial possibility, which I feel to this day, and that is the possibility of achieving through my body the peace that passes understanding.